Partners: Cisco Channel Commitment Is Paying Off In Big Sales Growth

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Cisco solution providers say the company's deep investments in helping them navigate rapid technology shifts and now the cloud recurring revenue business model transition are paying off in big sales growth.

Partners attending the company's partner summit in Boston, Mass., said they are seeing double-digit Cisco sales growth and expect the pace of that growth to continue given Cisco's focus on driving recurring revenue business models with them.

Gary Alexander, CEO of Alexander Open Systems, a $200-million Overland Park, Kan.-based Cisco partner, said his Cisco business is up 26 percent this year with robust sales of the vendor's bread-and-butter network routers and switches, unified compute system and Cisco Meraki wireless solutions.

"Things are going very well across the Cisco product line," he said. "We are now in Cisco's fourth quarter and our forecast is big. They are the best at helping partners make those transitions. They have the best partner programs of anybody out there. We make really good money with Cisco."

Alexander, one of 2,000 partners from 1,121 companies attending partner summit this week, said his business, driven by Cisco's products and services, was up $30 million in 2012, and he expects it to be up $36 million this year. Alexander Open Systems was singled out by Cisco with an award at the summit for best use of an application programming interface with a portal solution identifying real-time network trends.

Harry Zarek, president and CEO of Compugen, a $450-million Richmond Hill, Ontario, solution provider, said he expects his Cisco business to be up 12 percent this year. He said that is due to Cisco's ability to "figure out where the puck is going," and then team tightly with partners to capture those new opportunities.

"It is all about partner commitment," said Zarek. "There is no time wasted arguing about how to go to market. Cisco is very clean, very predictable. Lots of other people can learn lessons from Cisco on how to run a channel program. They focus on channel profitability."